Neolithic Toilets

Stone Age Toilets

Did people living in the Stone Age
have toilets?
Yes, at least some of them did, we have found
examples of indoor plumbing from the
Neolithic or later stone age!
Skara Brae is a large Neolithic settlement
on the Bay of Skaill on
the west coast of Mainland,
the main island of the
Orkney Islands,
just off the north coast of
Scotland.
It is a cluster of eight dwellings and it was occupied
roughly 3100-2500 BC.
The dwellings contain what are believed to be some of
the earliest examples we have found so far of indoor toilets.

Skara Brae is Europe's most complete Neolithic village
and it was discovered only in 1850.
It was well preserved when it was discovered,
and the early excavations were unusually careful for that time.

The settlement was built on, and into, a midden heap
from a previous settlement.
That is, a mound of domestic refuse,
or bluntly, an old garbage dump.
That material provided insulation against the harsh
winter climate at that latitude.

The structures were connected with narrow curving passageways
that were also covered
to protect the entire settlement from the weather.
The small size and curving paths of the passageways
limited the wind blowing through the communal structure.

Each of the houses, about 40 square meters in size,
was based on a large square room with a hearth at its
center.
The hearth was used for heating and cooking.

Some researchers concluded in the 1930s that peat was used
as the fuel.
However, more recent detailed analysis of vegetation patterns
suggests that thick beds of peat did not develop here
until after the settlement was abandoned.

Driftwood and animal dung are possible sources of fuel.
The people who lived here raised cattle and sheep, and there
is some evidence suggesting that barley was cultivated.
They also caught fish and collected shellfish.
But it's not clear that there would have been enough combined
driftwood and dung available to maintain the fires
through the long winters.

Dried seaweed seems to have been a significant source.
There is evidence in the form of a glassy, slag-like
material that seems to be a product of burning seaweed.

The walls and furniture are built from stone.
The local sandstone splits into plates or sheets
suiting it for certain types of construction.
There were few trees on the Orkney Islands
in the Neolithic era, and almost none today.
They used driftwood
and whalebone to form frames for the roofs.
Some of the driftwood came from northeastern North America
along the clockwise gyre of the north Atlantic.
Sheets of turf would have been laid over that framework
with thatch on top,
much like what has been used in the Highlands
and the Outer Hebrides through the early 20th century.

The following shows where the settlement fits into
prehistoric and historic periods.
Keep in mind that the later eras are defined locally as
the periods when cultural and technological developments
reached a given point in that location.
For Britain, the eras are commonly divided as follows:

Began about 10,000 BC with the development of
farming
crops of einkorn wheat, millet and spelt,
and the keeping of dogs, sheep and goats.
Farming communities appeared at Jericho about
8500 BC and spread to Asia Minor,
North Africa and North Mesopotamia by 8000 BC.
Pottery arose in various forms.
Jericho
(now in Palestine)
is often referred to as the first city,
going back to about 10,000 BC.
Çatalhöyük
(now in Turkey) is another early large
settlement,
from 7500 BC.
Agrarian societies appeared in southeastern
Europe by about 7000 BC and central Europe
by about 5500 BC.
Skara Brae was occupied about
3100-2500 BC.

Period when the main technology was based
on iron.
In Britain, considered to have lasted until
the Roman conquest,
at least as far as
Hadrian's Wall,
or until the mid-400s in Scotland.

Each of the Skara Brae dwellings contained a number of stone
furnishings.
Seven of the structures were dwellings,
following a common design.
The eighth seems to have been a common work area
for communal cooking and tool production.

Each dwelling was approximately square and about
40 square meters in size.
The entryway was at the center of one side,
out of sight at lower right in this picture.

A stone hearth was at the center of the dwelling,
the darker stone surface at lower right.
This would have been used for heating, light and cooking.

Opposite the entrance was a cabinet,
a stone set of shelves and compartments.
It would have been the first thing seen when entering the
dwelling, and it is thought that this layout was intentional
to display important possessions.

The sleeping compartments or bed boxes
were formed from thin slabs of stone
extending up at least knee-high.
Every room had a bed box on each of the other two sides
of the main room, at left and right as you enter.

The right-side bed was the larger one in every one
of the houses.
Lloyd Laing's
Orkney and Shetland: An Archaeological Guide
compares this to a custom that survived into the 20th Century
in the Hebrides Islands off the northwest coast of Scotland,
in which the husband's bed is always larger than the wife's bed.
Artistic material including beads and paint-pots have been
found in some of the smaller beds, providing some support for
this theory.

One corner beside the cabinet had some smaller stone boxes
referred to as tanks,
used for preparing fish bait.
Presumably the thin vertical slabs of stone provided the
rectangular structure and its joints were lined and
sealed with sheets of fish skin or animal bladder.

And now, for the toilets....

The other front corner, on the opposite side of the cabinet
from the bait boxes, is a small chamber referred to as a
cell in the material in the museum and at the
Skara Brae site itself.

This dwelling has its cell at upper right in this picture.

According to the explanatory material at the Skara Brae site,
drainage systems have been discovered in some of the cells.
According to their interpretation, the cells
"may have been toilets."

Other interpretations are more definite.
For example,
some say"A sophisticated drainage system was even incorporated
into the village's design, one that included a
primitive form of toilet in each dwelling."

So, are the Skara Brae cells Neolithic era toilets?

Probably.
Some people say that they are.
Some say that they may be.
No one seems to be saying that they definitely aren't.

The cell of this dwelling is at upper right in these views.

This dwelling is unusual in that it has a "secret compartment",
a sizeable storage area behind its cabinet.
This might have been used as a secret storage area,
although it's hard to imagine a secret lasting very long
in such a small and close community.

The best preserved dwelling, designated as House 7,
has some very fine carvings that were starting to deteriorate
as it was no longer protected by being buried in sand.
British Heritage covered the house with a glass roof,
but this made the deterioration worse instead of better.

They have replaced the glass roof with one of sod,
maintaining a much more constant environment inside the house.
This unfortunately means that you can't see it.
To make up for this, they have reconstruced an exact replica
that you can enter.

This shows the mounded exterior of the House 7 reconstruction.
Driftwood and whale rib roof beams would have supported
a roof of turf and thatch, and grass would have soon covered
that.

As you enter the dwelling from the narrow passageway
you look across the main chamber,
across the hearth to the cabinet.

One set of bed boxes is along the left wall.
The cell is in the far corner at the left of the cabinet.

Here it is, a view into the cell.

Logistics

Here is a map of the UK.
The Orkney Islands are just off the northern coast of Scotland.

The National Museum of Scotland
in Edinburgh
has a large and well-done exhibit of items from prehistoric
Scotland, including quite a bit from Skara Brae.
The museum at Skara Brae itself is small and mostly explains
the site — the artifacts are mostly in Edinburgh.

Almost certainly if you aren't British, and quite likely if
you are, you will travel to Orkney by way of Edinburgh.
See the
National Museum's collection
before going to Skara Brae, and see it again afterward
when it will make more sense.
Some of the collection is
available online.

Transport to Orkney

Inverness to Scrabster
(adjacent to Thurso),
3 hours 45 minutes by bus,
a few buses a day.

Scrabster to Stromness,
1 hour 30 minutes by ferry,
a few ferries per day.

Once in Stromness, check the bus schedules at the Tourist
Information Center at the ferry terminal.
There are a few buses per day stopping at Skara Brae.
After visiting Skara Brae and the adjacent Skaill House
(home of the Laird who owned the land and discovered the
site), you could return to Stromness via a later bus.

A better alternative if you get an early enough start is to
return to Stromness on foot along the
West Coast Walk.
It's about 17 kilometers along the tops of the rugged cliffs
along the west coast of Mainland,
the main island of Orkney.

A good place to stay is
Brown's Hostel,
just a couple of short blocks down the main Victoria Street
from the ferry terminal:
45-47 Victoria Street
Stromness, Orkney, KW16 3BS
+44-(0)1856-850-661
+44-(0)1856-851-780 fax
www.brownshostel.co.uk

Click here
for more travel pictures and suggestions from the
Orkney Islands, Scotland, and Britain.

My cromwell-intl.com domain appeared in September, 2001,
although the Wayback Machine didn't notice its one enormous
Toilet of the World page until
January 17, 2002.
Some time soon after that I split it into categories,
and the collection has grown ever since.

In December, 2010 I registered the
toilet-guru.com
domain and moved the pages to a dedicated server.